After the Immortal Disappeared

Chapter 127: Chapter 128: Sudden Reversal

Zhao Qinghe suddenly pointed at the lake below and said, ”Lui Yao is trying to escape by boat!”

Everyone looked. Lui Yao was gathering his remaining men, fighting as he retreated. He had untied the small boats from the wooden dock, clearly planning to flee to the center of the lake.

However, he only had thirty to forty fierce bandits left, and their numbers were still rapidly dwindling. The seven or eight boats by the shore were more than enough.

At this point, Lui Yao couldn’t be bothered with his image. He leaped onto the first boat, ready to head for the lake’s center.

Wu Shaoyi cut down two men with a swing of his saber, roaring, ”Seize the boats! Stop him!”

A tug-of-war for the boats erupted on the shore. Wu Shaoyi’s men, who had withdrawn from West Mountain, arrived one after another and unleashed a volley of arrows toward the center of the lake.

Lui Yao raised his shield and blocked them all. Two of his Personal Guards beside him were caught off guard, struck by arrows, and fell. Lui Yao shoved the two inconvenient bodies into the water. No one noticed him slip a hand into the lake and release some Medicinal Powder.

The powder turned red upon contact with the water, but the area was already so stained with blood that its peculiarity went unnoticed.

The bandit rowing for him was also hit by an arrow and died. The small boat carrying Lui Yao spun around twice, ending up less than ten feet from the shore.

Seeing him so close and thinking the bank here wasn’t very steep, Wu Shaoyi, anxious to kill his enemy, simply waded into the waist-deep water and charged directly at Lui Yao.

But a cunning smile played on Lui Yao’s lips:

’You brought this on yourself.’

Less than five feet from the boat, Wu Shaoyi surged forward. But suddenly, the water to his front left exploded.

SPLASH! A massive black shadow shot out from under the water!

The churning spray shot high into the air. When it fell, it became a fine, misty rain.

A rain thick with the stench of blood.

On the mountainside, Hee Lingchuan and the others watched, dumbfounded. Because before the spray even settled, they discovered:

Wu Shaoyi was gone.

Wu Shaoyi, that formidable rebel War General who had thrice cut down generals sent by the Royal Court, had been dragged underwater by the black shadow in a single instant?

A chill ran down Fuzzy Peach’s spine. He stammered, ”What... what was that?”

The black shadow appeared too briefly and moved too fast. Coupled with the dim light by the lake, even with their sharp eyesight, all they could see was a fleeting black mass.

But compared to the small boats nearby, it was absolutely massive!

Longer than two boats placed end to end.

This was a monster that no human strength could resist. Moreover, Wu Shaoyi had been attacked in the water; he hadn’t even had a chance to fight back.

The two Bandit Armies, locked in a life-or-death struggle, were both stunned. But their reactions that followed were starkly different:

The Lui Bandits whooped and hollered, raising their weapons in a ferocious counterattack.

They were as fired up as if they’d been injected with chicken blood, as if they weren’t the same ones who had been getting thrashed and begging for mercy just moments before.

In contrast, besides a few of Wu Shaoyi’s most loyal confidants who yelled ”General!” and plunged into the water to search for him, the rest of the Wu Bandits were at a loss.

”Lui Yao and his men know what that black shadow is,” Hee Lingchuan said, his voice strained. ”It’s the thing that killed Mrs. Zhu’s husband!”

Mrs. Zhu had mentioned that her husband tried to escape by boat. Before he reached the center of the lake, his boat capsized and he vanished. No one in the entire village, young or old, saw how he disappeared.

Wasn’t that exactly the same as what just happened?

In the moment the Wu Bandits were stunned, one of them suddenly screamed and fell backward into the water.

Something underwater was dragging and shaking him violently. He was completely powerless to resist.

The other bandits shouted as they scrambled for the shore.

The distance was a bit far, so Hee Lingchuan couldn’t hear clearly. ”What are they shouting?”

”It sounds like...” Zhao Qinghe suddenly pointed. ”Crocodiles!”

Fuzzy Peach also yelled, ”Holy cow, it’s huge!”

One after another, the Wu Bandits were dragged down. Clearly, something was biting people in the water. One unlucky soul had just set foot on the bank when a black shadow lunged from behind and bit him in half at the waist!

As the creature crawled fully onto the bank, Hee Lingchuan and the others could finally see it clearly. It was an enormous crocodile.

A massive crocodile, its entire body covered in menacing scales so black they shone.

This one was nearly twenty feet long. Another, over ten feet long, rushed over from the side and started fighting it for the prey.

A bite, a tear, and each crocodile took half.

Seeing the Wu Bandits flailing in the water, there must be more of these monsters at the bottom of the lake.

From this, they could deduce that the creature that ambushed Wu Shaoyi must have also been a Crocodile Demon. But that thing was so enormous, these smaller ones weren’t even worthy of carrying its shoes.

Humans have an instinctual fear of such monsters with their cavernous mouths and sharp teeth. The Wu Bandits lost all will to fight, screaming as they fled for dry land. Lui Yao let out a long laugh. ”Lads, get ashore!”

He pointed his giant axe at the shore. ”Listen up, you lot! Wu Shaoyi is dead! Those who submit to me now will eat meat, drink wine, and share the spoils with us from now on. Those who refuse can get the hell out of here, and don’t let me see you again!”

Aided by the terror of the dark shadow, he had instantly transformed from prey to predator. His men scrambled ashore and once again gathered around him.

By now, Hee Lingchuan finally understood. The scoundrel had deliberately feigned weakness, creating the illusion of escaping by boat to lure Wu Shaoyi to the water’s edge.

Wu, greedy for glory, had rushed in recklessly and fallen into the black shadow’s trap.

The situation had suddenly reversed. Wu Shaoyi’s side had lost all its advantage, and it looked like Lui Yao would have the last laugh.

And just then, Lui Yao suddenly looked toward the mountainside on the Western Route, as if he and Hee Lingchuan shared a telepathic connection.

There were torches on the mountainside, making the soldiers’ figures quite conspicuous.

Lui Yao grinned at them, then swiped a hand across his neck in a throat-slitting gesture.

At that moment, a few of Wu Shaoyi’s Vice Generals cursed at him, ”Submit to a low-life monster like you? And eat human flesh with you from now on?”

Lui Yao’s smile vanished.

Fuzzy Peach muttered, ”Now we’re in trouble.”

”We’ll hold out for as long as we can. We still have over a dozen carts, including the villagers’!” Hee Lingchuan remembered there was a Mage among the rearguard soldiers. He quickly found him and asked a few questions.

「The better part of a double-hour later.」

Lui Yao wiped a smear of blood and flesh from his axe and shouldered it. ”Assemble! Headcount!”

Wu Shaoyi’s remnants had been scattered. Some fled, some submitted, some surrendered, and the die-hards had all been fed to the crocodiles.

The smaller crocodiles also crawled slowly onto the shore, looking satiated. But the largest one did not appear, giving off the profound air of a leader who remains hidden.

After his men finished the count, Lui Yao’s force, which had originally numbered over two hundred, had been cut by more than half after Wu Shaoyi’s surprise attack. But now, it had expanded to nearly four hundred. If you included the seven hundred men in ambush at Whistle Rock and the five hundred stationed in the town, his total army had grown to almost sixteen hundred men.

But Lui Yao was still far from satisfied.

If the three parties had been able to rendezvous normally and he had secured the top position, his army should have been much larger than this.

After all, several hundred of the Wu Bandits had been unwilling to submit to him and had chosen to turn and leave.

And who was to blame for this situation? Lui Yao looked toward the mountainside on the Western Route, a cold light glinting in his eyes. ’If anyone’s to blame, it’s those damn soldiers!’